By IANS,
New Delhi : A city court Thursday allowed Delhi Police to withdraw a rioting case against a number of Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) leaders, including Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, during protests over petrol price hike in 2005.
Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate A.K. Kohar allowed the application, seeking permission to close the case on the grounds that the leaders had no criminal intention in violating prohibitory orders.
According to the charge sheet, Chouhan, BJP spokesman Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, Delhi BJP president Harsh Vardhan and parliament member Vijay Goel along with many activists had assembled near Jantar Mantar here June 1, 2005, to take out a protest march.
They allegedly broke barricades and assaulted policemen during the march on Parliament Street, forcing the police to book them under various provisions, including section 188 of the Indian Penal Code (disobedience to prohibitory orders), then enforced around Parliament House.